So, this Mike, who was in disbelief that the rest of the party found Max "awesome" after knowing her for a few hours, is somehow the same Mike who knew he loved El the second he saw her in the woods??
First, he thought El was a boy. Second, he was ready to send El away the next morning so he could get back to finding Will. Now Mike claims that he loved her in that moment? He's clearly lying and just saying either what he thinks El needs to hear, or what he's deluded himself into thinking. It's canon that Mike did in fact not even care about El that night in the woods!
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Hi! Long time no yap but I've been really bothered by this thing and I know you're just the person I can go to with this (even if we don't always end up agreeing at times).
I got into a tiff with someone in a comments section of a post that was about Amy (Which character do you think deserved to become a villain? or something similar). They brought up Amy's abuse of her boyfriend. I may have tried to defend Amy (key word is tried. I am officially rubbish at debating) but then I may have said something? Because they said that I (and apparently a lot of other fans) was excusing Amy's abuse because of her trauma. It got me stumped because isn't young Amy's treatment of Rory rooted in her trauma? Did I miss the memo where we separate trauma and abuse? Am I missing something?
That statement bothered me a lot because if there's one thing I never want to do it's defend an abuser. So here I am, humbly asking and hoping to clear the muddy waters.
Your really confused and disturbed moot, Tia 💌
TIA!!!!! Thanks for the ask 💌 , and I send you all the hugs.
Discussion of abuse, trauma, ableism, infidelity, and unhealthy relationship dynamics beneath the cut.
(First off… while I really appreciate your faith in my explaining skills <3 <3 <3 my passion for traumatized characters and mentally ill+neurodivergent rights doesn't make me especially qualified to fully clear muddy waters especially not knowing the full context, but I feel you, and what follows is my informed perspective!)
Speaking generally first, harm done in media is best examined by the impact on the audience, with a different lens than harm done to real people. While relatable experiences in media can be useful and validating and incredibly important, you can’t be “defending an abuser” when the abuse is fictional. It's actually normal for traumatized/ND/mentally ill people to project onto mentally ill villains, when villains are the only significant representation for those stigmatized symptoms in a media landscape that excludes and demonizes us simply for existing. RTD can't stop people who hallucinate from reclaiming the Master's Drums and projecting onto the Master, for example — 90% of the best Doctor Who psychosis fic by psychotic authors is about the Master, whether RTD likes it or not. It's not true crime.
(This is speaking generally. Amy Pond is very much not the Master.)
Abuse is a behavior, and there can be many reasons for it, but reasons based in trauma don’t make it not abuse (some forms of generational trauma can propagate abusive parenting styles, when the parent thinks abusive parenting is normal, or lives entirely vicariously through their child). This absolutely should not be taken to mean trauma correlates with abusive behavior; rather that abusive behaviors from traumatized people are more likely to present in specific ways.
Abuse is also a targeted behavior, based in control — not consistently displayed C-PTSD symptoms as seen in Season 5 Amy Pond through many aspects of her life. Mental health symptoms don't become abuse just because they hinder one partner from meeting the other partner's needs. Any life event can do that.
Without knowing the context of the arguments, this is the aspect of their relationship I've seen you talk about before (which I also feel strongly about), and what I assume is what you were debating? So, here I will talk specifically in regard to Season 5.
We all know Amy — she's never attached to Leadworth because she never wanted to leave Scotland, no steady therapist because none of them stick up for her, can't stick with one job yet her first choice is a job that simulates intimacy because her avoidant behavior (a known trauma response) isn't sustainable to her wellbeing. Rory knows her fears of commitment stem from her repeated abandonments, it’s why he’ll always wait for her, and it's why he blames the Doctor “You make it so they don't want to let you down.”, who apart from having caused a lot of her trauma, has actively taken advantage of her being the “Scottish girl in the English village” who's “still got that accent,” because he wants to feel important, so yeah, I think interpreting Amy's issues (and how Amy and Rory transverse them) as Amy abusing Rory indicates a fundamental misunderstanding of their relationship, as well as a misunderstanding of the (raggedy) Doctor’s role in Amy’s formative self-image (which of course she works through in Season 6, but I am sticking to Season 5).
Abuse is always based in control. That just doesn’t fit here. While Amy's detachment from her real life includes things like calling Rory her “kind of boyfriend” (which she is upfront about to his face; differing commitment levels isn't abuse, though it can be a relationship red flag for both parties IRL) — her Season 5 disregard of Rory’s feelings occurs only in response to the fairytale embodiment of her trauma. It's never a response to Rory; it's a response to the Doctor, who stole her childhood and led her by the hand to her death. She cheats on Rory with the Doctor in her bedroom full of Doctor toys, drawings, models, she made from childhood to early adulthood.
(And yes, like many repeatedly-traumatized people, Amy is prone to being sensitive and reactive. Take her “Well, shut up then!” line in The Big Bang; but given Rory responds to this by hugging her, clearly he doesn’t take it as her actually dismissing him. He knows her better than that.)
And by no means do I meant to imply this is fair to young Rory, poor Rory, who's left struggling with the feeling that his role in her life is in competition with the role of her trauma (aka the Doctor). But not every unhealthy relationship dynamic is unhealthy because of abuse. Labelling Amy's treatment of Rory in Season 5 more accurately isn't the same as excusing her harmful choices — but making mistakes is part of being human, Amy's mistakes are certainly understandable, and she works through them out of love for Rory.
If there's one thing to say about Moffat women, it's that Moffat allows his female characters the same grace that the male characters *coughTENcough* have always had, to hurt and struggle and make realistic mistakes and overcome those mistakes and to heal without being demonized.
Amy isn't perfect, but she is a fully realized character, and her story gives us a resonant depiction of childhood trauma.
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Hiiiii! So, a few days ago you were talking about the whole thing with Amy, Rory, and River. And when I saw those posts a thought arose in my head and I wish to share it with you.
Since River grew up with Amy and Rory as Mels. And Mels was Amy's best friend do you think that they ever talked about children? Since I know that it can come up when talking with friends, and like... do you think that Amy might've ever expressed whether or not she wanted children?
And if she didn't, that Mels would've had to listen to her mother say that she doesn't want children? The idea is so heartbreaking and sooo interesting.
What do you think about it?
no, no, see, you're so right and this drives me wild.
because, the way i see it, i don't think amy wanted children. she's somewhere on the 'hasn't thought about it' to 'vaguely negative feelings about it happening' range to me, which falls sharply into 'Not Happening Ever Again' post-s6. (specifically, in terms of having a kid herself, even if she could, i really don't think she would. i do love that she and rory end up adopting a kid later, because that does make sense, for amy pond who grew up alone in one universe with her family swallowed by cracks in time before the doctor helped her set it right again, for her to want to make sure another child won't be alone in the world like she was. getting off-track here.)
and that's so. because the first real memory river/mels has of amy is of amy shooting at her. and depending on how well the silence fucked up the rest of her memory, it might be one of the very first memories she has at all. that's how she met her mother, crying for help and getting a bullet instead. her mother tried to kill her, so of course, you have to think. she must have needed to hear that she was wanted, right? even if she was taken away, even if amy shot her, at some point, melody must have been wanted?
river is good at getting people to do what she wants, but she is very, very bad at subtlety. and mels is younger, has less practice, so when she wants to know this, she's just going to ask. blunt and quick, easy enough because amy's used to the way mels will open her mouth and you just have to be ready to roll with what comes out if you want to keep up. it's why they're such good friends (like mother, like daughter.)
they're nine, and mels asks if amy wants kids, and amy wrinkles up her nose and says she won't have time for children, obviously, once her raggedy doctor finally comes back. they're fifteen, and amy and rory dance will they-won't they in a way that makes mels twitchy to watch, and taunting amy about wanting to have rory's babies is a good way to get on her nerves. but amy calls her gross, tells her she's got more life planned than children would leave room for, and besides, imagine her, a mom? it'd be a disaster.
mels does. a lot. she looks at her mother and just sees her best friend instead. she's not even sure what she wishes was there, but. maybe amy's right. and besides. imagine her, a daughter, instead of the ticking time bomb she really is? it'd be a disaster.
they're sixteen, seventeen, eighteen, and on. mels stands on the outside of a love story that births a universe. and her. how do you compete with that? not that she would know, not yet, she hasn't been there. but it doesn't make her feel any less alienated when amy and rory talk in whispers about a half-remembered world that's bled through to this life, about roman soldiers and boxes and the big bang of belief.
all these memories, they never mention children. on amy's wedding day, she's different, not like someone remembering a dream but someone who lived it. rory stands straighter, won't leave her side, and they're both so much older than they were yesterday. maybe now, right? a wedding's as good a time as any to decide you want kids.
mels not being at amy & rory's wedding is such an obvious lazy way of them trying to explain why they totally didn't just throw this plot twist together at the last minute that i'm not even going to acknowledge it. of course she was at their wedding. she's their best friend. there's too many people around the doctor, and she wasn't ready today of all days, so despite this horrible burning need under her skin to strike, she stays her hand. doesn't let him dance with her because she might just tear his throat out if he gets too close. stays with amy and rory as the maid of honor should. she must have been there for the awkward questions that always gets asked, 'so, any plans for a baby?' 'when am i getting grandkids?' 'oh, you two are going to have gorgeous children together.' standing a few feet from amy in her wedding dress and watching her mother tense and grit her teeth and brush off the questions. watching her look nervously at rory but never ask if he means it when his mom asks him if he'd prefer a son or a daughter, and rory answers 'either one, some day, not anytime soon.'
god i'm just going on and on, aren't i. but really, what's it like to know that amy never changed her mind. the next time she sees them, she's already been born and stolen. i don't like let's kill hitler for. so many reasons. but there is something compelling about how recklessly river lashes out at the world, at the doctor. even her sacrifice at the end is almost suicidal, throwing all her regenerations into this man without knowing if that will even work or if it might kill her to do it. but it makes more sense in the context of someone who has reached the end of a long, long wait for some kind of indication, any kind, that her mother wanted to have her. and finally been told, no. she didn't choose melody.
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